Obake Memories
by LeahNardo
Summary: Update: Don't kill me! I've finished it! This is the story of a girl...and ninja. Written first back in 1999.
1. Chapter 1

**Obake Memories**

By LeahNardo

Chapter One: Ghosts

I have a lot of memories of my old Master's studio. It was on the second floor of an old, crumbly building; the kind that looked like it would fall down around your ears if you talked too loud. We weren't prone to loud speech around Sensei anyway. It was the kind of thing that would earn you extra push-ups and clean up duty. I never needed any help in that particular area. I still bear the nerve damage of having spent many hours with my knuckles pressed into Sensei's shiny hardwood floors, buffed by countless bare feet and a lot of my elbow grease.

It was weird, seeing it again after all these years. I wondered if it was my eyes, now tainted by a more upscale part of town, that made it look so old and run down. Or, if it had always been this way, beat up and comfortable like an old sofa. It looked like it had still evaded the graffiti that plagued the rest of the block. Perhaps everyone around here gave it the same deference I did. After all, one doesn't often come by a haunted building in New York City.

What pulls us back to the places we once lived? I have very few happy memories of this area; it was a low point in my life. My father was jobless at the time, and my mom was working almost every hour of the day. There wasn't a lot for a skinny thirteen-year-old to do, except dodging gangs and watching younger brothers and sisters. I suppose I could have joined one of those gangs, though heaven only knows what awful end that would have led me to. I was kind of an outcast, living in the world of my imagination. That's what led me to Sensei, originally; my imagination. I remember it started when my younger brother came tearing through the front door, bellowing at the top of his lungs.

"You are not gonna believe what's only two blocks away from here!"

I was reading a book while I was supposed to be watching a pot of spaghetti noodles boil, none too thrilled at being torn from my imaginary realm. Even more irritating was the fact that the noodles that I was supposed to be watching were now bubbling gleefully over the top of the pot. I managed an "Oh, cripes!" and set to haul the noodles off the burner.

My brother, undaunted, tried again. "Guess what we're living right close to?"

I wasn't biting. "An Indian burial ground." I went hunting for a sponge to try and sop up the water pooled on the stove.

"Close."

That stopped me. "Whatever. Manhattan didn't have any Indians, you dork." Satisfied at my superiority of knowledge (as most teenagers are) I continued my search.

He pursed his lips, I imagine trying to deem if this insult was worth holding his tongue. Apparently it wasn't. "Well," he said at length, "it does have ghosts."

"What, Manhattan?" I asked absently.

"No, the building down on—"

"Success!" I held up the sponge.

My younger sister walked in, and looked down at me with the air of an eight-year-old queen. "How come dinner isn't ready yet?" She looked at the stove, and gasped. "Oh, you messed up the noodles, mom's gonna—"

"THERE IS A HAUNTED BUILDING ON 49TH STREET!"

We both stopped and stared at him, his little ten-year-old chest heaving in exertion, fists clenched. My sister, the doubting Thomas, put a fist on her little hip and demanded, "How do you know?" Dinner was quite forgotten.

Eyeing us both carefully to make sure he was now the center of attention, he leaned back on the table. He lowered his voice in a conspiritory fashion and hissed, "I SAW it."

I quirked an eyebrow. "It?"

He lowered his voice to a near-whisper and narrowed his eyes. "The ghost."

My little sister's eyes bugged out, and placing her other fist on her hip, leaned forward and struck a lecturing pose. "No such thing."

He looked indignant. "Says who?"

"Mom." She stuck her chin out. "You'll be in trouble if you try and scare me."

The situation degenerated from there. From "Mom doesn't know everything." to "I'm telling! And you're gonna be _so_ grounded!" to my dad walking in and asking why dinner wasn't ready, which diverted everyone's attention back to food and the mess on the stove, and made everything that my brother had said go completely out of my head.

It wasn't until the next day, walking down 49th street toward the grocery store, that his words came back to me. I scanned the street for any potential ghost haunts. Nothing struck me as being particularly haunted-looking. The extent of my experience with ghosts was limited to cheap movies from the sixties, most of which also included the murders of the teens unlucky enough to have their cars break down near said haunted houses. Thrillsville. Still, the idea was enough to set my overactive imagination in motion with other horrible possibilities.

Suppose it wasn't a ghost, really, but some serial killer hiding from the law in one of the abandoned buildings? There were several near by, and I moved to the outside edge of the sidewalk, peering carefully into doorways as I walked. My worry gears went into motion. Suppose my brother wanted to go back and see if his "ghost" was still there? It would be just like him, I thought in irritation. Still, I knew very little that I could say would deter him. The little putz never listened to me. My thoughts had brought me all the way to the grocery store, and I placed them at the back of my mind as I pulled out my list.

I resumed thinking as I returned home by the same path, overfull grocery bag leaning precariously on my small chest. I was looking between a loaf of bread and a head of lettuce, and trying not to trip over cracks in the sidewalk (This made thinking somewhat difficult, as you can imagine). Maybe if someone older volunteered to go with him--not me, of course. I was about as weighty and intimidating as a matchstick, and just as wimpy. I would not be an effective defender (Not to mention I was chicken). My dad would not be taken by such flights of fancy, and my mom was too busy.

That left my reserves at zero. I didn't know anybody around here; we had only moved in a few weeks before, and the neighbor kids had not exactly made themselves amicable. I had scabs on my knees and elbows from the local gang for failing to carry any change on me. Suffice to say, I had no immediate friends to call on.

I ran through several other, less appealing ideas, and rejected them in turn. As I did, the coin purse I had the remainder of my parents' money in worked its way to the lip of the bag. Just then my beat-up sneaker snagged on a sidewalk crack, and the purse flew out. I cursed my bad luck, and tried to crouch down to pick it up (No small feat with a weighted grocery bag). I overbalanced, and the groceries went everywhere. Great, bruised lettuce. My mother would be ecstatic.

I picked up the groceries hurriedly, as I was kneeling right in front of the entrance to an alley; not an entirely safe location. I had a package of chicken in one hand, and a sack of nickel candies in the other (Paid for with my own stash of pennies) when I spied my coin purse being sniffed by a rough-looking Tom cat.

"Don't even think about it!" I snapped, and of course he didn't listen. He took off, the purse dangling from his jaws, _post haste_ down the alley. I stuffed everything in the bag hurriedly, and ran after him without thinking, groceries in tow. "Come back with my money, you stupid hairball!"

My mother would kill me. I had almost twenty dollars left in there, budgeted for groceries for the rest of the week. There was no place else that food was coming from, and I would be trotted down to hell before I'd let a mange bunny on legs run off with it.

He disappeared into a doorway not twenty feet into the alley, and I stopped. I may be stupid enough to run down an alley in broad daylight, but into a condemned building? With aforesaid ghosts/serial killers? I gazed squinty-eyed into the dim, dusty depths of the doorway. It was too dark to make anything out.

I couldn't go home without that money.

I _couldn't_.

"Kitty?" I called into the yawning void.

Silence.

"Here, kitty, kitty, kitty!" I chirruped syrupily. "I really need my wallet back, you wonderful, sweet, pretty kitty, kitty!"

KLUNK! Something crashed inside. I jumped and started back violently, but nothing came sailing out the door at me. After a few heart-pounding moments, I stepped up to the doorway again. "Kitty? Is that you?" I called shakily. Just a box the cat knocked over. You know the cat's in there…it's just a cat…

You ever get the feeling you're being watched? I did, right then. By more than one pair of eyes, too. WHAM! WHAM! WHAM! The sound of my own heartbeat suddenly seemed terrifyingly loud in the silent alley. I tried to breathe as quietly as possible for a few moments, listening. My neck prickled. I _was_ being watched. Not wanting to peeve off any resident ghosts/serial killers, I called, somewhat louder than before, "I need my wallet back…uh, please? My mom's gonna be really angry with me if I don't get it!"

WHAP! My wallet hit me in the chest. I screeched and jumped back against the brick wall, dropping my grocery bag, which luckily didn't scatter everything. Before another thought could enter my head, I grabbed the bag and my coin purse and took off, not stopping until I reached the end of the block.

When I had crossed the street, I collapsed on the steps to somebody's house and just sat shaking for a few moments, trying to collect my frazzled brain. People walking by didn't look at me strangely. There are a lot of weirdoes in New York, I was just another one. I pulled out my wallet with trembling hands and opened it up. All of my money was still there.

Instead of reassuring me, it sent me into wild speculation. What kind of person gives a dumb kid their wallet back with all the money intact? A cat certainly hadn't thrown it. Had I seen anything move in the doorway before my wallet was thrown out at me? In my now terrified thoughts, I started to imagine some crawling, creepy—I shivered. Stupid, stupid, _stupid_! What if somebody had tried to grab me? What would I have done?

It was only after I regained my composure enough to walk home that I noticed my bag of candy was missing.

I didn't say anything to my parents when I got home. They'd be furious at me for losing the wallet, and then going after it like that. "You might have been _killed_!" My mom would say. However, I did corner my brother the first chance I got.

I backed him against the kitchen counter. "Where was that building you said was haunted?"

He looked at me funny. "I told you, over on 49th street."

"Yeah, but _which _building?"

A sudden grin lit his face. "You wanna go see?"

I nodded. I needed it proven that I wasn't nuts.

We walked outside after I bellowed to my parents that we would be back in a while, and we trotted up the street. I was all too aware that this was the one thing I _really_ didn't want to be doing. I was now pledged, however, and backing out would mean I was a wuss, beneath the likes of my little brother. Such thoughts of status are unfortunately all too important for teenagers. The thought that should I be grabbed and, no doubt, killed, I would be relieved of my treasured status, did not occur to me at the time. Kids are kind of stupid that way; at least, I was.

I was thinking self-assuring thoughts as I tried to look brave. This is hard to do when your knees are knocking. I'm not a coordinated person to begin with, so the overall effect was terrible. I looked like an ostrich trying to do the Tango, and not having much luck. My brother took notice of this, and, being the tender and thoughtful soul that brothers often are, he needled my like a pitbull after a pork chop.

"Scared?" He leered.

"Of course not. Don't be stupid." I stumbled over a curb, and he laughed.

We were not looking down the street. This was unfortunate. If I had, I would have turned and, not walked, but sprinted in the opposite direction, to Hades with my brother and his thoughts of me. For, down the street stood a group of people I did not particularly want to see. This was the self-same group that had taken great pleasure in giving me all the scabs and bruises currently adorning my skinny body. I did not see them, in fact, until I had very nearly run them over. (I have many times before and since run over the wrong people. It's a great talent of mine.)

"Hey." A boy in a leather jacket grinned. He looked to be about sixteen.

My heart stopped for a moment as he strolled up to me. It was a short moment, the one right before I got knocked to the pavement.

"Hey!" My brother yelled, just before he got pushed out of the way.

The guy in the jacket leaned over me. "Got anything for us today, Princess?"

I _hate_ being called Princess. I still do, to this day. It's the kind of thing your uncle calls you right before he pinches your cheek. It was then that I noticed we were right in front of the alley I had been in earlier. Fast behind that thought was the one of _Oh I forgot to take my wallet out of my pocket my wallet and the money for groceries and, oh, No! They're going to steal it!_

This brought out a kind of fighting spirit in me. The prospect of not eating for a while will do that to you. I had already had to rescue the flipping thing once that day. It seemed terribly unfair that I should have to do it twice. Still…

WHAM! My foot connected awkwardly to his kneecap, and he fell back. I was on my feet in a second. My brother stood frozen outside their circle.

"Run, you idiot!" I shouted, and managed to knock my way through the circle and into the alley. This was not the brightest thing I could have done, seeing as it left me very few options of where to run. However, in an emergency, I was not known to think stragistically. One must learn not to be picky when one is dumb.

I was, however, still in possession of enough of my senses to not run into the doorway I had previously had a close encounter with. I glanced behind me long enough to see that my brother was close on my heels, and then tore out of there as fast as my ostrich legs would carry me.

_Why _do they put fences in alleyways? It is absolutely amazing the amount of bounce a chain-link fence has, when run into at full throttle (I don't recommend trying this at home). I ricocheted off it like a super ball off linoleum and landed, quite painfully, I might add, on my back while connecting my head to the pavement. I also took out my brother in the process. I had, in one fell swoop, doomed us both. One neat, moronic little package.

I was less than thrilled. Actually, I was bemoaning myself to the fire escape above me, where, I swear to Pete, there was a little furry man standing.

Stop. Rewind. _There was a furry little man on the fire escape._

I must have hit my head harder than I thought.

I blinked once, then again, but he stayed there. On the other side of the alley, on a balcony of the now-twice-cursed building, there stood, get this, a very large turtle. _With a sword._ You know, one of those pointy things they have in old Japanese movies like _Shogun_? Ha ha! The joke's on me! Not ghosts, not serial killers (At least I desperately hoped not) but little _animal_ people adorned with sharp objects. The whole thing took on a kind of surreal quality from there on out (I'm sure the thwack to the head helped).

I found myself looking up at Mr. Leather Jacket again. He didn't seem quite so scary by comparison. In fact, he seemed downright laughable. So I laughed. Heartily. This, as you can imagine, did not go over well.

Just as he pulled back his big meaty fist to add to my bruise collection, something else connected to him. Or, I should say, to the back of his head. I didn't even see what happened to the others. It happened _that fast._ And, just as quick, I found myself lying in an alleyway, surrounded by people lying in weird, prone positions. It was totally silent. I noted that the furry man was no longer standing on the fire escape, and wherever he was, his turtle friend had joined him.

It seemed as good a time as any to have hysterics, so I did.


	2. Chapter 2

**Obake Memories**

By LeahNardo

Chapter Two: The Invisible Men

I consider myself to be a relatively levelheaded person. If someone walked up to me and stated that they had just watched a giant turtle and a fuzzy man, or, rather, not watched them take out a large group of very burly teenagers, I'd back away from them very slowly and look for a blunt object to defend myself. Now that it had actually happened to me, however, the idea did not seem so nuts, especially with cold pavement at my back (I have noticed that pavement seems to make a situation seem that much more real. Have you ever dreamed of lying on concrete? I thought not). Oh, sure, I have my flights of fantasy, but seriously? A giant turtle with a sword? Who would make that kind of stuff up?

I came out of my panic to find myself curled up against the wall like a baby. It was somewhat consoling to realize I was not the only one freaking out about the situation. Everyone looked really shaken. A girl not five feet away from me, who looked to be eighteen, was bawling her eyes out.

"What…what the heck _was_ that?" my brother gasped.

A couple of the gang members got unsteadily to their feet, and ran for it, all thoughts of my brother and I out the window. I can't say that I blame them. I was too frozen from the shock, or I would have _joined_ them. I would have joined Jack the Ripper for lunch at the moment. It seemed a far cry safer than staying in this alley.

My brother got to his feet, scanning the area around him carefully.

"They're gone." I told him.

The guy with the leather jacket looked up at me, fear in his eyes. "What? Who's gone?" He looked around in a panic. "What the hell are you _talking_ about?" My brother was looking at me with the same kind of fear.

I pointed up at the fire escape. "Those two people. The fuzzy man and the big turtle with the…" I trailed off. It suddenly seemed ludicrous, what I was saying. The guy with the jacket obviously thought I was crackers, and he made a limping run for it. I looked at my brother. He seemed pretty freaked by me, too. "Didn't you see them?"

He shook his head. I looked up again, seeing an empty fire escape, normal as the day is long. I suddenly realized that I was probably the only person who had seen them, lying on my back the way I was and as far up as they were. They probably hadn't meant for anyone to see them, and I had just got lucky. I mean, seriously, how often do you look directly above you? (Think about that. It will keep you looking up for _days._)Something THUDDED nearby, and we both jumped.

Get a grip, will you? It was probably a cat in the garbage cans.

THUD!!

_Or not._

"Let's get out of here, huh?" My brother sounded as afraid as I felt.

We made a quick exit from the alley on shaky feet. Back out in the sunlight, the people continued walking down the street, like there had never been sword-wielding-chelonia cruising the alleys. It was insane. _I_ was insane.

We stopped by the same steps I had sat on earlier. They were getting to be kind of familiar. People walking by probably thought we lived there, like we were normal, average, non-supernaturally accosted kids.

I looked at my brother intently. "You swear you didn't see them?"

"I swear!" He held up his hands in defense.

We sat in silence for a moment.

"Hey sis?" He lowered his voice.

"Yeah?"

He looked freaked. "You know the building with the ghosts?"

I swallowed and closed my eyes. "Yeah?"

"That was it."

Dinner didn't exactly seem top priority when I got home. Besides, my mom had come home early. She wanted to know why my jeans now had a hole in them. My mom _obsessed_ about keeping us in clothes (Mothers are like that).

"Well, um…these guys chased us into an alley…" I began.

"There was this ghost, mom…"

"It wasn't a ghost, it was some…um…big animal-thingys…"

"They beat up these guys who were picking on us…"

"Not like they didn't NEED it…"

"I didn't even _see_ them…"

She didn't exactly believe us. That's the problem with not being an adult. No one takes you seriously (It's _hell_ being thirteen. To adult to act kiddish, to kiddish to be taken for an adult. Trust me, I remember). It didn't matter that, had I been her, I would have laughed my _toes_ off. _I _had seen it, and therefore, it was law, plain and simple (You've all been there, right?). So, facing seven nights of dishes, I flounced off in a huff to the room I shared with my sister. She was, unfortunately, already there.

She looked up from her very beat up Barbie doll, a hand-me-down from me (I felt kinda sorry for it. Barbie had lived through many haircuts and now looked like a ten-time loser in a hatchet fight). "Where have you been?" She lorded.

I paid her no heed. I had suddenly realized, with utmost horror, that my bedroom window led _onto the fire escape._

In light of recent events, this was a dilemma, to say the least. To say the most, I figured that a snowball had a better chance in Death Valley in the summer than someone trying to make me sleep in my bed tonight. I was to the thinking that I was going to have trouble sleeping _ever again._

I looked out the window.

_There was an alley out there_.

A trip to my aunt's was looking really good about then.

You ever notice how things that seem mildly scary in the middle of the day can suddenly become life-or-death terrifying in the middle of the night? You can imagine what my situation seemed like at three AM. With no one else awake, not even my partner in crime (The louse slept like the dead), I was seeing werewolves in the closet and demons by my door. I was tempted to hide under my covers, though I knew they would offer no protection from whatever nameless fear I thought was lurking right outside my window. So I lay as still and frozen as I could make myself, and pleaded.

"Please, if I ever live to see tomorrow, I will never pick on my little sister again." I whispered frantically.

The only sounds to answer me were the squeal of tires and someone yelling far away. Not to mention my sister grinding her teeth. I wished for them to stop; the better to listen for any animal-people sneaking into our apartment (It didn't seem to farfetched an idea at the time that they might want to come after me; because I was, I don't know, _there._ I _told _you I had an overactive imagination).

"I will never complain about doing the dishes." I continued to offer.

Far away, a car alarm went off.

"I will give the rotten kids next door my candy stash."

Something crashed outside, and I tensed, my heart pounding. I could leap for the door. I could wake my dad up. I could scream. That would wake _everyone_ up…my neck prickled as something creaked. _That sounded like it was right outside my window_.

Pleading with the Fates was not helping my case. I had to take destiny into my own hands; I wasn't going to sit like a lump and _wait _for something to get me. I hesitated a few moments, then jumped out of bed and dove for the light switch. I flipped it on, and scanned around my room frantically. So far, stranger-free. The window was a dark and dangerous void, I couldn't see out. My sister slept on, heedless to the goings-on.

It took a mustering of courage to open the door to the hallway. I peeked down the hall to the living room, scanning for any unfamiliar shadows. Satisfied that nothing was moving, I tiptoed into the living room, where my brother was sleeping on the couch (I wasn't going to wait for those things to get me, I'd rather they got my brother instead. C'mon, tell me you haven't thought about it!). I poked him hard in the ribs. "Hey!" I hissed.

"Whazzat?" he grumbled, turned over, and jerked up and away from me, howling as he did. I jumped as well, slapping my hand over his mouth to silence him. He grabbed my hand quickly away and glared at me like only a brother can. "Geez, I thought you were some burglar or somethin'." He glared at the clock on the table. "Oh man, what'dju get me up for? Go 'way!" He rolled over into his blankets.

I glared at his back. "There's something outside my window." I hissed.

"Whaizzit?" His voice came muffled from the blanket.

I clenched my fists and waved my arms desperately. "I don't know…something!"

He rolled over and got up. He moaned, "Oh, _man_!" and shuffled down the hall. This wasn't the first time I had made him check for burglars, or serial killers, or, well, you get the idea (Hey, it was bad enough that I had to go to my _little_ brother in the first place, the ultimate show of cowardice. I don't deny that I'm a spineless weenie, at least at night, or, well, at least to myself, anyway).

He shuffled back to the living room and looked darkly at me. "There's nothing out there." A statement.

Okay, now what? "Did you open the window and look?"

"Yeah, I opened your stupid window and looked." He snorted. "Wuss."

I started back down the hallway. "Shut up." I growled over my shoulder. Still, I felt better knowing he was awake and within yelling distance, should whatever it was decide to make an untimely return. The fact that, should someone real and dangerous and, no doubt, bigger than either of us, come in, there was nothing he could do to help me was not something I figured into the equation. Don't bother me with details, sonny. He was better than nothing at all (If you've ever been awakened by a nightmare at night, you know what I'm talking about).

Back in my room, I didn't feel quite so brave. I climbed up onto my bed, and peered out the window. "There's nothing out there." I whispered. I was hoping that if I kept telling myself that it would go away. Face your fears and they will go away, is what my mom would say.

I got up and crept toward the window. I looked around the corners as far as I could, and then, in a quick rush, yanked it opened and stuck my head out.

Nothing. Go figure.

Except…what was that? There was a piece of litter caught around one of the bars. It looked like a little candy bag from Emmett's Grocery store, printed with the logo and everything. With the doodles that I always put on them to separate them from the vegetable bags…

_Just like the one I had lost in the alley earlier._

My brother wouldn't mind if I slept on the floor. With all the lights on. At least, he better not.

I was primed for a fight. Nobody, otherworldly or not, was going to scare me out of _my _bed. Now that it was daylight, I felt distinctly braver. Prepare to meet your maker, villains, the matchstick cometh.

I was armed with a large butcher knife (Which I didn't have the slightest clue how to use to defend myself. Details, details), a flashlight, several large rocks (I'm a rotten aim, by the way), and my little brother. I was going into the Lion's Den to face my enemy.

I freely admit it was the most idiotic thing I have ever done. I look back at what I did, and wonder that I'm even _alive_ right now. It could have been a bunch of psychos I was going after, for all I knew. Nonetheless, I went.

It was somewhat of a boost to my courage to see some of the neighborhood kids see me coming and actually cross the street. Word gets around, I guess. I probably wouldn't have been as psyched if I knew they did it because they all thought I was nuts. I imagine I probably did look pretty weird, a kid in beat-up jeans and sneakers, wielding her mom's butcher knife and bulging at the pockets. I probably had a crazy look in my eye, too. It was the kind of mood I was in.

I stood at the proverbial doorway to Hell, and tried to screw up my courage. I mean, it wasn't like they had actually hurt _me_ the last time. Yeah, they even _defended_ me. Somehow, having someone like that take an acute interest in my welfare didn't have the appeal it normally would. Not when the subject was adorned with pointy, lethal-looking objects. _And obviously knew something about using them…_AND had been on my fire escape. Eating my candy.

That was the final insult. I had saved my pennies for those, dammit all. Scrimped and scrounged and _begged_ for those. Washed _dishes_ for those (Washing dishes was the bane of my existence). Only to have them snitched. It was a rotten thing to do to a person, I fumed.

And so I went in, my brother in tow.

It was a mess. Dust everywhere, and overturned crates. There were scraps of lumber and wire and heaven knew what all else all over the floor. It didn't look too scary, actually, and I took heart. In fact, it made me kind of cocky.

"Hey!" I bellowed. "You gonna come out or what?"

Silence.

My brother looked at me like I had lost my marbles. "Maybe they're not here right now."

I turned on my flashlight a shined it around. There was a staircase over on the side wall, leading up to the second floor, I assumed. Some of the stacks of crates were well over ten feet tall, with lumber stacked on top. An ideal place to hide, I thought.

I leaned back and let loose. "Hellooo!! Anybody home? I got a bone to pick with you guys!" I stopped, listened again.

Nothing. The cowards! All right, I would have to go in after them.

I stuffed the flashlight in my brother's hands. "Go look behind those crates." I pointed (Hey, you didn't think I was gonna go by _myself_, did you? Even I'm not that dumb).

The crates played weird shadows on the ceiling as we panned the flashlight over them. We both jumped to look behind them, feeling a little relieved when nothing was there. We continued this with every pile. Finally, after much adrenaline had been expended, there was only one pile left. They _had_ to be behind this one. If not, I would have to go search the second floor, and I wasn't sure if I could screw up the courage to go someplace where the door was not in immediate sight.

We snuck up behind the last pile, and tiptoed toward the back of it. They had to be back here, somewhere.

I leaned against the pile of crates to support myself. One of them shifted a little, but I didn't pay it much mind. I had bigger fish to catch.

I never even saw it coming.

You know how in cartoons, when someone gets bopped on the head, they see stars? That really happens. Except they don't tell you that it hurts so much that you really can't appreciate the Technicolor show. I heard someone tell me once it was because of your optic nerve getting yanked around. Whatever it was, it felt like a fireworks display had gone off inside my head. The last thing I thought before going under was:

No, it wasn't them, those mysterious strangers.

I had been taken out by a fricking _crate. _Gnad, life was unfair.


	3. Chapter 3

**Obake Memories**

By LeahNardo

Chapter 3: Imps

I don't know what I would have done in my brother's position. That is, all alone in a scary place with a suddenly unconscious companion. I can imagine he was pretty freaked out. If our positions were switched, I could only hope I wouldn't run screaming out the door and leave him there. It would be a terribly inconsiderate thing to do. I wasn't worried, though (Being unconscious). He was a pretty loyal kid. My respect for him went up several notches when I awoke to hear his voice (Not that I told _him_ that).

"We're really, really sorry." He said.

"You two should be more careful. This place is old. Your sister could've gotten hurt a lot worse."

That wasn't my brother. Egad, did he go get the police, or something? It would be so embarrassing to have adults in on my stupidity...

"Dumb kids. Why don't you guys ever leave this place alone?" Another voice said in an irritated tone. Two cops, one from Brooklyn, by the sound. I tried to think of a viable excuse to be in an abandoned building, but none came immediately to my aching brain.

My brother answered them. "Well, Maggie," That's me, by the way, "she was thinking you guys were ghosts or goblins or something. She thought you were out to get her."

_The cops_ were ghosts or goblins? That was cause for inspection. I opened my eyes and swiveled my head.

I was lying on an old sofa (!), no longer on the first floor of the haunted building. There was laughter coming from across the room, where my brother sat on a couple of gym mats, by the look. There was light streaming in from the dirty windowpanes, illuminating the hardwood floors, and the cracked mirrors that lined the side of the room. It looked like an old dance studio. _Weird._

It also illuminated, not one, but _four_ turtle-men, loafing on several more gym mats and laughing with my brother.

This was something of a shock.

I opened my mouth, probably to scream, but the only sound to come out was between a croak and a squeak. I was beyond speech. They all turned to look at me.

"Hey, Maggie!" My brother said cheerfully. "They're not ghosts!"

Now _there_ was the revelation of the Century. My brain tried to jump start to retort, but words continued to fail me. My brother didn't realize these guys could be _dangerous_. That they were carrying weapons, by the look of it. That they hung out on fire escapes, spying on people (Eating their candy…). I sat up quickly.

They all jumped up at once. "You shouldn't get up, yet." One of them said in concern. They stayed a fair distance away from me still, I guess they knew I was scared.

"Perhaps you would like some tea." I jerked around to look at the voice behind me, and saw the small, furry man that I had glimpsed yesterday.

All present and accounted for, sir!

He looked like a large rat, up close. Or a whiskery dog. He was carrying a _tea tray_, for crying out loud. I would have laughed, had my vocal chords been in working order. Instead, I merely squeaked again and promptly gave in to a coughing fit.

He handed me a cup of tea when I came out of it. I took it, and stared at the contents suspiciously (I didn't like tea back then. Tea was for little old ladies with blue hair and several cats).

"It ain't poisoned." The turtle-man from Brooklyn intoned dryly.

I looked up at him, startled. Actually, that possibility hadn't yet occurred to me.

"Maggie thinks _everybody_ is out to get her." My brother offered. The twit.

I finally found my voice. "Shut up, pea brain. I do not!"

This prompted a chuckle from the turtle-men. I'm glad they found my plight so amusing.

I twisted around to glare at them reproachfully, when I noticed, to my utter horror, that one of them was holding the butcher knife that I had earlier been wielding. I probably should have been glad that when I had my untimely encounter with aforesaid crate (Ha, ha) I had not landed on it, causing my somewhat unpleasant and no doubt very messy death. As it stood, however, I was mortified that I had been caught.

What exactly does one say to those whom one has been planning to attack with sharp, pointy objects? Especially when they have saved you from, well, your own stupidity? 'Gee, it wasn't like I was planning to kill you, or anything. Maybe just a couple of nicks for good measure, ha, ha'?

The turtle-man offered it to me. "This isn't very sharp." He said helpfully. "You guys should probably get a whetstone."

_Squeak_. "Thanks." I replied weakly. _Squeak_.

They seemed rather amused by my brother's explanation of my plan of attack. I sat in silence, sipping my tea (Which, in my opinion, tasted like weeds pulled from the gutter. As I said before, I did not like tea), feeling, well, really dumb. What the hell was I thinking? Charging in gung-ho to attack who knew how many number of people who were, no doubt, bigger and stronger than I, and thinking that I could win. Or, say, force them into an agreement to leave me (and my candy) alone in the future. Well, I have said before I don't have a lot of foresight. This was just example "A".

"It sounds like something Raph would do." One of them said gleefully.

"Who?" I asked, pulled from my train of thought.

My brother pointed at the sour-looking one from Brooklyn. "Him."

He did not look at all happy to be compared with me in that way. Well, I can't say I blame him. _I'd_ probably have disowned me if it were feasible, the way I was feeling at the moment.

My brother introduced me to all of them in turn. The one called Leonardo reminded me of my Dad when I was in for a lecture. He looked kind of old, and serious, like he wasn't prone to laughing much. Donatello was the next one, and he seemed amiable enough, but he didn't say anything. He didn't really look at me, either. I think he was kind of shy. Michealangelo was, well, how do I describe him? He looked like he smiled all over. He had been the one to hand me my knife. I get the feeling he did it just to tease me, like he thought it was cute, a skinny girl like me planning to attack them. He had an impish sort of grin; mischievous. Raphael, well, I already said he wasn't glad at all to see me. I made a mental note to stay out of his way (Avoid the path of the tornado, so to speak). And the furry man, Splinter. It turns out he _was_ a rat. He reminded me of the wise and venerable master on _Kung Fu._ ("_Very good, grasshopper_…") Had the same beard, too.

I asked a lot of questions, "Where did you come from?" and the like. They gave me the whole song and dance of how they were created, and how they had lived in the sewers (Ick. Double ick!) for all this time, and they only came above ground when they couldn't be seen, like late at night. How they were always so cautious. I asked them how old they were. They said "Sixteen." That ranked them pretty high up in sophistication, then, at least in comparison to me. Splinter said, "Far too old to count anymore," but he smiled as he said it.

When I asked them why they didn't just let the world know they existed (Instead of ghosting around people's fire escapes), Raphael replied tartly that, "How would I like to be stuck in some scientist's fishbowl and most likely dissected?" I hadn't really thought of it that way.

Leonardo then took the opportunity of chewing me out royally for, as he put it, "acting irresponsibly and carelessly when I should have known better, and didn't I know more than to put my little brother in danger?" I felt pretty guilty (He always inspired that in me. It was his unique gift). I even said I was sorry. He seemed satisfied with that, so I left it be.

They seemed to get a kick out of my little brother. I think they liked it that he didn't act at all perturbed, and talked just like he was with a group of his friends, laughing about how dumb his older sister was (I was a favorite target of his mirth. He was my little brother. That was his _job_). I think they also liked having an admiring audience. He was asking them all kinds of questions about how they moved so fast, and "could they teach _him_ how to beat up those kids?"

Leo started showing him how to punch right, when Mike noticed that I was still there (I had just kind of sat there, willing myself and my sore brain into the couch cushions, which were doing a fair job of trying to swallow me without my help), and came over to make himself friendly-like. "How's your head?" He asked cheerfully.

"Rotten." I sighed. I had a headache, I was allowed to be crabby.

Undaunted, he tried again. "How's your tea?"

I pulled a face. "Rotten." I said with more emphasis, staring irately into the cup.

He smiled; a puckish sort of grin. _Imp._ "Probably just needs sugar."

"Well, there doesn't seem to be any around." I gestured with my hand.

He looked thoughtful. "Darn," he mused, "Wish I still had some of those candies. You coulda melted one in there, or something."

_My_ candy?

"It was you!" I said in a sudden fury, poking him in the plastron. Everyone looked at me, but I was beyond care. "You stole my candy!"

"I didn't steal it! Honest!" He held up his hands in defense and frowned. "You dropped it in the alley, and I figured we weren't exactly gonna see you again…and we didn't know where you lived…" He shrugged, as if that explained it all, and then said, more penitently, "I'd give it back if there was any left."

"Pig!" His brothers chorused, and Donatello made "oinking" sounds. It was the first sound I had heard him make. I stared at him, and he looked quickly away. I think he blushed, but I couldn't tell, his skin was too dark.

I returned my attention to the culprit. "But you ate it on my _fire escape_!" I insisted, like a dog worrying a bone. "I saw the bag!"

He blinked at me, his face blank. "That was _your_ fire escape?" He finally inquired.

"Yeah!" I stuck my chin out.

He blinked a couple times more, then looked at his brothers, amazed. "Wow. Is _that_ a co-inkidink, or what?"

"What." Donatello stated dryly.

Good grief, you mean it wasn't on purpose? I thought he did it to taunt me!

"You mean you saw him?" Leonardo asked in a worried tone, and glared at Mike. There was an awkward silence, while Mike squirmed next to me.

I pursed my lips. "Well, not exactly…" Now everybody was looking at _me_ funny. " I just kinda knew he was there." They actually looked impressed for a moment. It was a short moment.

"Whatever." My brother snorted. "You just heard bogeymen like you usually do and made me go check. You just lucked out, seeing that bag." He smirked at me. Ouch. Score one for the younger sibling.

I tried to salvage my pride. "How do you know what I did and didn't see? You weren't there, dipstick." But it was a lost cause. They were trying not to smile, I could see it. Fine, let them laugh at me. I was getting used to being the butt of the jokes around here (Or so I told myself. My dignity was suffering somewhat). So I sat, and fumed, vowing not to say any more.

My brother jumped up suddenly, staring at his watch (One of those cheap ones that they sell for 99 cents) "We have to get home! My mom's gonna be home soon, and Maggie has to make dinner!"

I think they were sorry to see him go. I don't know what they thought about me. They made us both solemnly swear never to tell anyone about them, and Mike again apologized for snitching my candy (I forgave him, of course. What else could I have done? It's not like he could chuck it back up again, and even if he did, I wouldn't want it).

They showed us the way downstairs, and told us to be careful going out the alley ("There might be bad people down there." They didn't get why I laughed). They also warned my brother to check my eyes every hour and make sure I didn't have a concussion, or something.

I think we were both thinking the same thing as we walked out the door. My brother was the one to voice it, though.

"Um, you guys come here a lot, right?"

Mike answered for them. "Yeah. It's kind of our topside hang-out, when we can get the locals to leave it alone."

My brother looked at me, and I nodded.

"Can we come back? Maybe, like, in a couple of days?"

I think they looked flattered, and Mike said, with enthusiasm, "Sure!"

It had taken a lot of stretching to make my sister believe that my brother and I had been at the arcade all day. Especially since we didn't have any money, and I kept rubbing the monster goose egg on the back of my head. She kept a suspicious air about her, though, and I'm sure she was upset thinking we had gone off and had fun without her. Fortunately for us, my mom had worked late, and my dad was out job hunting, so they never even knew we were gone.

I had spent most of my time telling myself it had been real, whatever my common sense (Of which I hadn't much) told me. All through dinner, my brother's eyes kept sliding toward mine, and we'd both look away and grin. Having a secret was not uncommon between us kids, but then again, this was no common secret. It was better with two of us. If it had been me alone, I'd have been dying to tell someone, but I basked in the knowledge that Brian (My little brother) knew as well. It was _our_ secret. Let torture and parents come, we would not tell.

I slept like a log that night, probably due to my head (Hey, it was the second time in as many days I had hit it. You'd be zonked out, too). It might also have been due to the fact that I knew the Bogeymen were, at least for time being, on my side.

If knowing the "Things That Go Bump in the Night" were pretty easygoing doesn't make your mind rest easy, I don't think much in this world will.

We hadn't had time the next day to go visit what we now thought of as "our" haunted building. My dad was home, and in a cleaning mood. I was forced to clean my room, which was never quite up to code. I'm a slob, I don't deny it. My sister was a neatnik. This made for lots of arguments.

"Why can't you ever put your clothes away?" She asked in exasperation. Being chastised by someone five years younger than you on issues of responsibility is less than a joy, let me tell you. It also pricked my pride (As well as my conscience).

So we cleaned all day, and I _still_ ended up making dinner (Who says the world is supposed to be fair? Who made that rule up? I think I was absent that day in school). When my mom came home, we kids all rushed out to meet her.

"Save us, Mom!"

"Dad made us clean _all day_."

"And I didn't even get to watch my cartoons. And Maggie made me help her with her side of the room!"

It must be tough being a mom. Especially as hard as my mom worked. I feel guilty now knowing the crap I put her through, though she assures me that she will get even by spoiling my children rotten. I don't doubt she will.

Anyway, I was out of the kitchen for probably two minutes, but when I walked back in, my mom exclaimed in surprise, "Honey, where did you get those cookies?"

Cookies? What cookies? I hadn't had time to make any cookies! Yet there they were, basking in chocolate-chip smothered glory on the kitchen counter.

My brother and I looked at each other, knowing exactly what had happened.

How in Hades had they gotten in and out of here without anyone seeing them?!

We searched for an explanation that my parents would believe. "Mrs. Johnson baked a bunch, and she said we could have the extras." My brother lied.

It sounded fairly lame, as Mrs. Johnson's son was one of the kids who hated my guts, but my mom bought it. I think she was too tired to argue.

We ate them, every last crumb. They were _wonderful._ Who'd have figured one of those guys to be an expert cookie baker? Not me, but I don't mind being pleasantly surprised. We'd have to bring back the chipped plate, but that could wait until tomorrow.

I wasn't even surprised to find a scrap of paper under my windowsill when I went to bed that evening.

_Hope this makes up for the candy --Mike,_ it read.

I went to sleep smiling.


	4. Chapter 4

Obake Memories

**Obake Memories**

By LeahNardo

Chapter 4: Dragons

_Deja Fu The feeling that somehow, _

_somewhere, you've been kicked in the _

_head like this before._

_**On Martial Arts and Metaphysics**_

The place was a mess. It was obvious that no one had been here for some time. Dust covered the floor, and litter was scattered hither and yon.

It made me sad to see it. After all, I had put one-seventh of my week every week into cleaning it. The broom and rags were still there, even. I picked up the broom and started sweeping. It was the least I could do for the place. How many times had I swept this floor? Buffed and rebuffed its surface until not a speck of dust marred its shine? A large part of my training had involved cleaning this place. At the time, it seemed like busywork, but I can look back and know it made me stronger. A refining fire fueled by dust-bunnies and floor wax.

What had pushed me to start training? I think it was Raphael that goaded me into it, originally. I never could turn down a real challenge, and he had a way of challenging everything I did…

School had just started (What? You didn't think I went to school?), and I didn't get to see them as much as I had in the summertime.

The remainder of the summer had been memorable. We had gone down to our building almost every day. They weren't always there (Off doing whatever important things ninja did outside fooling around with my brother and me, I guess. They didn't tell us much about their daily routine), but Brian and I had fun anyway.

And the pranks they pulled on us! I got in trouble when my mom's flute kept disappearing, and then reappearing in my room. Things got moved around the house and we'd have to go searching for them. I had a time talking my way out of trouble when a whole pot of spaghetti floated off and magically popped into existence on the fire escape. Some people have car key gnomes, I had _every_thing gnomes. They told me where to find something if I couldn't after a while, but usually not before I got a lecture. My mother was convinced it was me, and when I kept talking my way out of it, I think she worried I was becoming a pathological liar. I think it was Mike doing it, for the most part. He thought it was terribly funny when my candy stash was whisked away (He gave it back after many threats and a few whacks from his brothers).

But then I had to go back to school. It was hard for me. I didn't need to be told I was awkward for my age. I also found myself suffering from an acute case of breast envy. So what if the other girls had chests and mine was still abysmally flat? So what if I didn't have to wear a bra and nobody even noticed? Unfortunately, these were not things to be discussed with the opposite sex, no matter what species they were. So I suffered in silence.

Donatello proved to be a Godsend when it came to school work. I am really bad at math, and anything involving numbers (I've heard there are people out there who love numbers and math and anything of that sort. I envy them). It took him a while to warm up to me, but once I got his mouth going on something he knew about, I very nearly couldn't shut him up. He was also exceedingly patient. I am in no way easy to teach anything I don't immediately like, as I have no patience. I'm surprised he put up with me. My algebra book suffered for it, as did his ears. Leonardo helped me out occasionally, too. He was appalled at my lack of good study habits, saying many times I lacked discipline. I ignored him for the most part, and for the not-most part, argued and got generally frustrated. One did not win arguments with Leonardo. One did not even have the occasional draw. I left from most study sessions with him in a peevish mood. I am not a good loser.

Which is probably what helped Raphael goad me into training. Being, as I said before, not generally liked in my neighborhood, I got pushed around a lot in school. A good day was when the bruises were not where my mom could see them. Raphael regularly ripped into me for it.

"Why don't you ever stand up for yourself? Knock 'em on their butts!"

I would usually glare at him, already frustrated and feeling very much like the wimp he thought me to be. "Because I can't _win,_ that's why."

He would often shake his head, baffled. "At least then you'd know you _tried._ You just let 'em walk all over you!" And he'd walk off, growling to himself in thorough disgust. I don't think he understood those who were weaker than he was, or so I regularly thought.

Trying to fight, instead of just getting out of the line of fire ASAP (This was my usual tactic), seemed to me just another way to get thoroughly pounded. I would put up a fight when cornered (I don't just curl up and take it. I'm not a _complete_ weenie, just most of one), and this _did_ get me thoroughly pounded on more than one occasion.

One such occasion was on a Friday afternoon in October. The wind was cold, and I was wearing a favorite scarf my grandmother had knitted for me. Someone saw fit to grab the scarf. As it was still attached around my neck, it did a good job of stopping me. I found myself surrounded by unfriendly faces, one of which I had one-upped in World Geography class that day (I didn't say I was dumb at _everything_. I happen to really like some of my subjects, like English and Art and History and such. Ones that couldn't nail me with weirded out logic. I'm actually kind of smart at some of them. This was another source of trouble for me, as I don't excel at keeping my mouth shut).

The guy I had outdone in Geography was in my face now (I was still at an age where it was okay to hit a girl. We hadn't quite reached phase where this becomes "uncool") "You think you're so frickin' _smart._"

Well, no, I _knew_ I was smart, though I wasn't really feeling such at the moment.

"You think it's funny, makin' everybody laugh at me?" He hissed.

I relished the small revenges, most of which were in class. It gave me a short-lived sense of triumph to know I knew more about some things than they did. It usually came back to bite me in the butt, but I couldn't seem to stop myself.

I get a shove from behind. "How do you know so much, nerd girl?" Another boy snarled.

Usually I don't say much. It pays to keep one's mouth shut in situations like these. But, as I said, sometimes my mouth runs away with me. "How can you not, loser?" I said in irritation. My mouth fights back, even though the rest of me can't quite back it up.

I didn't see it coming. Those guys can be pretty fast when they're angry.

Getting punched in the stomach is a rather unpleasant experience, especially if they get you just right. They got me in that spot that stops your lungs from working and is just excruciatingly painful enough to make you want to groan, but you can't. It usually keeps you from focusing on anything around you, as well. You're to busy trying to breathe to care about much else.

It was actually over pretty quick, as these things go. Maybe two minutes. Some random adult usually comes and breaks it up. We were still close enough to the school for it to be a teacher. I was the worse off, as it had been five against one, but I got a few choice licks in. Not enough to make me feel better about the whole sorry situation, but it was better than nothing.

I finally wandered into our warehouse, and was horrified to notice in the cracked mirrors that I was developing a whopper of a black eye (My mother would have kittens), when Raphael decided to lit into me with his usual lack of tact.

"Got whipped again?" He snorted condescendingly.

It was, all in all, the straw that broke the Matchstick. I felt my face screw up into a hideous snarl (No small feat as it was swelling), and I gave him as withering a glare as I could muster. "I'm sorry I'm not a freaking _ninja_, all right?!" I yelled. "Like I've trained for this crap!" I threw my book bag at him with all the strength left in my stick arms, and grew even more frustrated when he dodged. "If you're so damn good, why don't you _show me how_, then, huh? Instead of just shooting off your big, fat mouth about it!"

Everybody in the room, my brother included, was staring at me in shocked silence. Raphael looked at me warily, tensed for some other move, I guess. Like I was going to try to fight _him._ I'd had enough of a beating for one day.

"That is a very good idea."

We all turned. Splinter was sitting on a beat up easy chair we reserved for his exclusive use, and looking at me with keen interest, his whiskers twitching.

I blinked, not quite comprehending (We don't often remember things we say in anger, even right after we say them. Ever notice that?). "What?"

"You would do well to have some formal training, child." He said calmly. "I believe it would do wonders for your discipline." This a tad chiding.

All right, so I lost my temper, well, a _lot._ So I beat up my textbooks and couldn't win a fight at school. But it had been me who said it. _'Why don't you show me_ how, _then?'_ I must admit the idea intrigued me. They had already been showing Brian a few moves. Why not me? I needed it more than he did, anyway. He got along with _his_ schoolmates.

"Raphael will be an excellent teacher for you."

_"WHAT?"_

"Yes." He said again. "Raphael will do very well."

I think Raph looked as horrified as I felt.

Ye Gods, anyone but Raphael. I would sooner brave _Leo_ than Raph, and I knew what a slave driver _he_ was. Raphael _despised_ me. We despised _each other_. I was the epitome of wimpiness, in his eyes. He was a completely insensitive jerk, in mine (In other words, he was exactly like an older brother, though I little cared to admit it).

Raph opened his mouth, I think to say something to the order of, "The _HELL_ you say," but he never got it out.

"You will start now." Splinter folded his hands in his lap sagely, the matter closed.

Great. Just peachy. So much for learning anything useful; I would instead become a human punching bag.

I began by doing push-ups. A _lot_ of push-ups. Something in the upper double-digits number of push-ups. My opinion of Raphael was suffering for it.

"You need to build more muscle," was his first assessment of me.

He was not starting off gently. After my stint of push-ups, my arms were shaking. My _everything_ was shaking. He found my endurance severely lacking. His solution to this was to make me do a large set of sit-ups to accompany it. Then several laps around the perimeter of the studio, studying me critically with every step. That was one thing I could do well. I excelled at running (I'd had lots of practice). His brothers didn't interrupt him, and I took it to mean they agreed with his methodology. It didn't give me much leverage to argue with him.

After I had finished ten laps, he let me stop to catch my breath.

"All right. Now you're warmed up."

Warmed up? That was just the warm up? I'd never survive this.

He hauled out several of the gym mats, making a square of floor space I assumed we'd use to train on. Well, at least my feet wouldn't suffer for all this. I was pretty keyed up, actually. I would finally learn how to kick some butt, even if it meant they'd have to scrap me off the walls first. I wondered what we would be working on first.

"Do you usually do punches or kicks first?" I asked.

He gave me a look. "You ain't learning nothing about that."

What? What the heck was I doing all this for, then?

"C'mere." He pointed to a spot in front of him.

I walked up to where he told me, easily within the range of his fists, and felt rather nervous doing so. For valid reason, it turned out.

WHAM! My butt hit the mat so hard I bounced. He didn't even punch me. He just sort of shoved me over.

I looked up at him, pissed as all get out that he'd taken such a cheap shot. Like I didn't hurt enough already. He was looking at me thoughtfully, though, and it stopped my mouth temporarily.

"You don't fall right." He concluded finally.

_That_ set me off. "How am I _supposed_ to fall? Like there's a right way."

Leo answered from behind me. "Yes, there is, actually."

Humility is a good thing, I'm told. It goes down kinda hard, though. Like swallowing nails. It was especially galling to get it from Raph.

I sucked in my lower lip. "All right." I got slowly to my feet. "How do I fall right?"

Raph told me to show up the next day bright and early and in old clothes. So I came in, at the crack of dawn by my clock, with a yawning brother in tow. He wasn't about to miss any misery on my part.

Raphael was standing impatiently in the middle of the room.

"You're late."

I didn't apologize. I could hardly move, I was so sore from the day before.

The mats weren't out. That meant more push-ups. Crud, I didn't think I could handle any more push-ups.

It's amazing what you can do when you're forced. If I stopped, I got a smack in the middle of my back by a broom he was holding. The push-ups were the lesser of two evils, at that point. My brother added such encouraging comments as, "You are such a wimp."

He was the first person I was taking out when I got good at this.

After I went through the same routine as yesterday, my muscles were fairly limber, by comparison. I waited for Raphael to haul the mats out, but he didn't. Okay, something new. I could handle that.

He handed me the broom.

What, weapons already? He pointed at the floor.

"Sweep it." He ordered.

What the heck was this? "The Karate Kid"? _Wax on, wax off…_

I looked at Leo, but no explanation was forthcoming.

Donatello smiled. "Clean it well, Grasshopper."

I snorted. "I'm more of a "walking stick bug", Don."

His grin widened. "You _were_ paying attention in science."

Michaelangelo held up a couple of rags and a can of floor wax. "Got more after that, Mags."

Like I didn't clean enough at home.

My shoulders were suffering by the end of it. It had taken me three full hours to sweep and buff the floor, and Raphael made me do it more than once.

"You missed a spot." He grinned evilly. The power-hungry sadist. I was severely tempted to take the broom to his head. Fat lot of good that it would have done me, I'm sure.

We practiced falling again. If anyone had told me I needed to practice how to fall, I would have asked for some of what they were smoking. It takes on a certain realism when you're hitting the mat over and over, though. Especially when you're as sore as I was.

I thought I was finished when he put the mats away. I was laying on the bare floor, thankful to be simply stationary for a few seconds, when he walked over and hauled me to my feet again.

"Fifty push-ups." He ordered.

I think Mike felt sorry for me, after I had finished the same routine again. I was leaning against the mats, wishing death on Raph and Brian and most especially myself, when he plopped himself next to me.

"It's always really hard, at first." He smiled sympathetically.

I sighed, stretching my sore back. "Like you haven't been doing this since you were born." I paused, and gave him a rueful smile. One had a hard time wishing bad things on Mike. "Do you even _remember _before you started training?"

He scratched his chin thoughtfully. "Not really. Splinter always had us doing some kind of exercise, even when it seemed like games to us. It was pretty hard, sometimes." He leaned over in a conspiratory fashion. "You know something?"

"What?"

"I hate push-ups, too." He whispered. "Splinter used to smack me with his stick a _lot._"

I giggled. He smiled. It was hard to be in bad mood with the cheerfulness he exuded. He was contagious.

Raphael walked over to where we were laughing, and stared at me seriously. "You gotta do 50 push-ups and 100 sit-ups before you go to bed at night, too."

Mike frowned. "C'mon, Raph. She just started yesterday. Give her a break, huh?"

Raphael glared at him. "She needs to get stronger before she can learn anything else. When we get down to the gritty stuff, she won't have time to do the strength stuff here. She'll have to do it all at home."

Don frowned, too. "You're worse than Leo, Raph. Remind me to never let you run practice."

Raph snorted at him. "Say whatever you want, Stick Boy. You ain't teaching the Twig, here."

I stuck my tongue out at him.

He folded his arms and gave me a dirty look. "Listen, Bean Pole, if I gave Splinter that kinda crap, he'd toss me through a wall." He leaned over, an inch from my nose. "You start treating me like a Sensei, or I'll wup your bony behind. Got that?"

Yeah, I got it. Power had gone to his head. Still, it was that, or get the wall treatment. I nodded.

"Good."

He walked back over to his own corner, where nobody bothered him, and I glared down at my lap.

Mike leaned over to me, frowning gently. "Believe it or not, he knows what he's doing, Mags."

I picked at a ragged fingernail, one of many, and sighed. "You're the experts."

Guess I had a lot to look forward to. My "sensei" was a dragon. All I could do at this point was sit back, and hope I didn't get burned.


	5. Chapter 5

Obake Memories

**Obake Memories**

By LeahNardo

Chapter 5: Changelings

He was driving me into the ground. And, no doubt about it, enjoying himself thoroughly.

We spent the first week just on falling, and I got fairly sick of getting chucked this way and that to make sure I got it right. I once decided not to show up when Raph told me to, just to defy him. Just once. I won't go into gory details, but it was not an experience one forgets anytime soon. It involved getting woken up at Oh-God-thirty in the morning by a pounding on my window (Which very nearly gave me a heart attack, all by itself), and a lot of floor buffing. _And _a lecture from Leo. _And _a talking-to from Splinter. _And_ the subsequent reminders from my brother, who stayed by me through it all (Most likely to gloat).

And you thought _your_ teachers were rough on _you._

I developed a kind of rhythm after a few weeks. It got to be a regular, everyday thing to get bruises on my arms and legs (And every other surface which can, and is, used for blocking). Once we got around to the technical stuff, like defensive stances, I actually started to enjoy my lessons. Or, rather, the first half of them.

I spent the latter half being dragged up off the floor, and moaning.

"No, just let me die!" I told Leo as he pulled me to my feet, for the third time that day.

Raphael growled at me. "You gotta learn to take it if you're gonna dish it out, Princess."

I twitched, visibly. He had taken to calling me that as soon as some birdie had squealed to him that I hated it (I suspected my brother). Don said it was good practice for my control. 'Don't let your enemies rile you' and all that. It didn't make me despise it, or Raphael, any less. It wasn't a lesson I had mastered, as of yet, either. I charged him, sore muscles forgotten, and got knocked flat yet again.

There was an interesting pattern on the ceiling of that room, and I was getting to memorize it quite well.

I think Raph knew when to call it quits. "Enough." He towered over me. "You're not learning anything at this rate."

I sat up. I don't like being called a quitter. "But-"

"Lesson's over for today." With that, he retreated to his usual corner.

I knew better than to back talk him now. That kind of behavior would get me a couple hundred push-ups. I'm a slow learner, but once the lesson gets through, it's gospel. But I still didn't like it. I didn't like the way he treated me, and I especially didn't like his superior attitude.

I joined Mike on a pile of mats. He always managed to pull me out of my bad moods. He offered me a box. "Animal cracker?"

I grabbed a couple and stuffed them in my mouth. Speaking around them, I asked, "Don't you feel kinda like a cannibal, eating these?"

Donatello chuckled on my other side. "I don't think even Mike can anthropomorphize a cookie."

Mike stopped chewing long enough to give his brother a confused glance. "Anthropo-what?" I shared the question.

Don grinned, in his element. "Anthropomorphize: to give human emotions and characteristics to an inanimate object or something perceived to be incapable of such." I must have looked impressed, because he drew himself up as he said it.

"Ah." Mike answered, and stuffed another handful in his mouth. "Don't think they mind being eaten too much."

My brother tossed a hippo into the air, and caught it in his mouth, grinding it to little cookie bits in savage satisfaction. "Why do you figure they make 'em shaped like animals?"

I gave him a condescending look. "So little testosterone-crazed maniacs like you can satisfy your urge to mutilate helpless creatures?" I popped another cookie in my mouth.

Mike gapped at me and gave a sudden yell, "Aaahhh!"

We all started violently and stared at him. "What?" My brother had dropped a few of his cookies in surprise.

"Maggie!" He gave me a horrified look. "You just ate a turtle!"

Don rolled his eyes. "Then again, maybe he can…"

Splinter gave us all a chiding look from across the room, where he sat reading. We all giggled helplessly and tried, with little success, to muffle it with our hands. Even Leo got a small chuckle out of it, and he didn't laugh much. Raphael snorted and shook his head over in the corner, mumbling about idiots in general. He was thumbing through a car magazine that had seen better days.

I tried to ignore him. It was the only way he didn't get to me.

Splinter finally called me out on it. He knew something was bothering me.

I felt like I was in a confessional at church. Splinter had that gentle priest kind of appearance, and it made him easy to talk to. Easy to rant at, too.

"He's driving me nuts. Why does he have to be so 'holier than thou'?" I griped.

Everyone else had left. The Turtles, for some practice time wherever it was they lived, and my brother home to start dinner in my stead. It was just Splinter and me; me on the floor Indian-style, Splinter in his patchy chair.

Splinter sighed. He reminded me of a very fuzzy version of my eighty-year-old grandfather. I'd have bet he had wrinkles under all that fur. I had much time to think about that sort of thing, as his contemplation of my statement stretched for several long seconds.

"Raphael," he spoke finally, "Is much like you."

Was he joking? I was _nothing_ like that irritating, over-bearing side of beef. My expression must have said as much, because he qualified the statement.

"He sees himself in you, child."

Oh, he did, did he? Flattering himself.

"You both have a strong will, and much emotion to control."

So I had a temper…and he had a temper. I wouldn't deny that. It still didn't make me like him.

"He is happy with how quickly you have learned."

He _was_?

Raph had not given me so much as a pat on the back (A few punches in the back, but never a pat). Was he really happy with my learning ability? That was quite a shocker. I never would have guessed he was happy with me. 'Raphael' and 'happy' did not go together in the same sentence. A twinge of guilt for my dislike twitched to life in my chest. This was food for thought. I frowned.

"He _hates_ me." That was the main reason I had such a dislike for him. I didn't like people who didn't like me.

"He does not understand you or the motives behind what you do." Splinter frowned, too. "Raphael rarely 'hates' anyone."

"You're joking." I spluttered. Egad, that knocked the foundation right out from under me. How was I supposed to hate him now, if he didn't hate me? But it wasn't like Splinter would lie to save my feelings. He wasn't that sort of person. So I would have to take him at his word.

He sighed again. "Raphael needs this experience to learn patience of his own. His distemper with you stems from the difficulty he has in expressing what he wants from you. He is learning as much, or more so, from you than you are learning from him. It is not easy for him. That is why it is he, and not Leonardo, who is your teacher."

I nodded in agreement. Leo would make a good teacher. He probably ate, slept, and breathed this leading stuff. Suddenly, it struck me. "What, am I your guinea pig, then, or something?"

I didn't like the thought of being someone else's practice. Didn't I rate better than that? My upset must have showed to Splinter. Gads, I was an open book to him.

Splinter smiled. "I would not have let Raphael be your teacher, child, if I did not think you would also benefit from his lesson. You would not learn so quickly from Leonardo."

That gave one thoughtful pause. "So he really is proud of me, huh?"

His smile widened. "Very much so. You are his prodigy, and you do him credit, thus far."

"He's not much for showing it, is he?"

"He has trouble with what he perceives as 'weak emotions'."

I was going to have to go chew on that for a while, and it was getting late. "All right." I rose to my feet. "I have to go, before my mom calls the cops and reports me missing. See you later, Splinter."

"Good bye, Maggie. Think on what I have said."

Getting called out on the carpet at training did not prevent me from getting called out at home. My absence had been noted one too many times, and my mother wanted me home more often. Was that clear?

Drat, just when I was starting to get good!

I went to bed after my now normal stint of exercises and thought, as Splinter had bid me to do.

What if Raphael actually liked me? Or had liked me, as I had been too much of a snot to him now for anyone to stand, much less someone with his microscopic fuse.

Guilt chewed at me. I _wanted _him to like me (No, not mushy like. As if he would be like that, anyway. Don't you ever want your teachers to like you?). Not being able to come to practice as often was not going to do wonders with his temper.

I needed a peace offering. Something that he would like, but wouldn't label me as a weenie and make him come down harder on me.

It was weird to start seeing things from Raphael's point of view. Maybe he was driving me into the ground because that's what he was _supposed_ to do. It hadn't occurred to me that he had any reason for being rough on me other than his general disdain. I mean, Mike _had_ said they themselves trained just as roughly, if not more so, but I hadn't quite seen it in that light until now. No wonder he thought I was such a whiner.

I vowed to keep my pains to myself and try harder. After all, according to Splinter, I now had a reputation to uphold!

I just wished my throat didn't hurt so much.

I never got the chance to uphold any reputations. It was quite possibly the worst time I could have gotten Tonsillitis.

I could do without my tonsils. I wasn't sure I could do without my new friends for so long. I had to go to the hospital to have my tonsils removed, and then I had two weeks of bed rest to look forward to.

I was frustrated, sore, and my medication was making me sick. In short, I felt rotten.

I was also bored. One can only read so many books in succession without physical activity and still remain sane. We didn't have a TV (We'd managed to break our last one several months before and hadn't yet run into the money to replace it). No one would play any board games with me (My brother was under strict orders not to excite me, and my sister was deathly afraid of catching something). Food had no draw, I could barely swallow, and it was more of a chore than a pleasure. So I lay in bed, trying to think of interesting things (My ceiling was not nearly as interesting as the one in the training room, I noted).

There was a rap at the window. I looked up, and who should I see, but Raphael.

He wouldn't come to chew me out for not practicing, would he? I walked over to let him in. Even Raph was better than looking at the ceiling.

He made himself comfy on the windowsill while I climbed back into bed.

We sized each other up for a long minute.

"How're you feelin'?" He asked finally.

I remembered my vow not to whine. "I'm okay." Croak, croak. I sounded like a frog with laryngitis.

"Your brother says you're feeling pretty sick." He cocked his head at me.

"Stupid medication." I countered.

He smirked. "When're they letting you outta the nuthouse?"

"'Nother week." Succinctness paid when your throat was on fire.

He had a package in his lap, I noted. He fingered it carefully. "Wish Mike had come, he's better at bedside stuff." He mumbled. "I'm your teacher, though. So Splinter said I was s'posed to."

"Not very fun, working with me." I croaked woefully. I'd had time to get good and sorry for my behavior regarding Raph.

He smirked again. "I was worse. Still am. Ask Splinter."

"I will."

A smile. He smiled! And promptly looked at his lap again. "You're not so bad, Princess." He said it almost with affection. Wow. I guess Splinter had a talk with him, too.

"'M a pain in the butt." I sighed. If you can possibly croak and sigh at the same time.

He snorted and smirked again. "Yeah. You got spunk. A regular Dragon Lady." I think he would have been more disappointed by the opposite fault. Maybe I was like him, after all. I detest people with no backbone (Never mind that half the time _I_ didn't have one).

My mom called from the living room. "Maggie, sweetie, do you want some juice?"

I called back hurriedly. "Not right now, mom." Croak, croak.

Raphael hopped quickly off the sill and walked up to me. "Here." He shoved the package into my hands. He gave a careful glance to my bedroom door, and headed toward the window. "Hope you get better soon." That came out painfully.

"Thanks. Tell everyone else thanks, too." I smiled.

He was gone. They moved so fast when they wanted to. I needed to stop blinking, or I'd never catch on to how they did that. Good thing he did, too. My mom walked in the door a second later.

"I know you don't want anything, dear, but you need to eat more. You can't afford to lose any weight." She eyed my skinny arms on top of my blanket.

I'd already dropped a few pounds. Most of it the hard-earned muscle I'd worked for in practice. The whole thing was frustrating.

She set the glass of juice on the bedside table, and walked over to the window. She frowned. "It's too cold to leave the windows open, Maggie."

I froze. "Sorry, mom." She hadn't yet noticed the lump in my bed from the hastily hidden package.

She headed for the door. "Make sure you drink that juice."

I put on my best agreeable grimace. "Yes, mom."

After she left, I sipped my juice while looking at the contents of my package. There was a mess of daisies on top, and a cute handmade card with a frog ("Heard You Croaked" was written on the outside. Mike's work, I guessed). A care package. A note with rough capitol letters instructed me on the practice routine I was to take as I got better this week. Raph's work. There was a mess of computer components hooked together, and it took me a minute to figure out it was a homemade video game. From Don. A little brush and some funny-feeling paper marked the last contents. That must be Leo's contribution. Hmm. Maybe he thought I should take up some kind of painting? Or calligraphy? Stuff to mess with, anyway. A far cry better than the cracks in the ceiling, as entertainment went.

It was nice of them to provide me with stuff to do. I'd have to give them all hugs when I saw them again. When I would be starting at square-one, training wise. Again. There was a challenge I wasn't looking forward to.

Things were looking up. Raph and I just might get along, due to our coinciding change of heart. I might just live through this, after all.


	6. Chapter 6

Obake Memories

**Obake Memories**

By LeahNardo

Chapter 6: Destroying Angels at the End of Time

THUMP!

I rubbed the back of my head where it had hit the hard wood floor. "Could you do me the courtesy of not chucking me off the mats next time?" I asked in irritation.

Raphael chuckled, and crouched down, waiting for me.

We had gotten to the point where he didn't need to say much; I knew when I had screwed up. I had even gotten to the point where I usually knew what it was specifically that I _had_ screwed up. There's progress for you. Raph had thrown a feint at me, and I fell for it hook, line, and sinker. Tut tut, little matchstick.

There was a point when I would have lain on the floor, agonizing at such a twinge of pain as shot through me then. Not so, anymore. You wouldn't think gritting and bearing it would be something you learn, but it actually gets easier with time. Besides, it seems less painful when you know exactly just how much _more_ you can possibly hurt. I hadn't managed to break any bones yet (Thank all the Gods and Angels for milk. It really _does_ do a body good. It should, I drank enough of it).

I stood up, and made myself ready again. Raphael didn't give warning before he attacked. No tensed muscles, no "en guard," just _whoosh_, and you had better either get out of the way or block _real_ fast.

I found the best method of operation was to get out of the way, as opposed to getting my arms bruised. I was pretty quick on my feet (Female agility. Good thing, too. Raph could pack a wallop of a punch, and he hadn't pulled any in months.)

Punch, punch. Dodge, dodge. Jump up to avoid the sweep and oh, _**shoot**__ get out of the way _WHAM!

It wasn't until I hit the mat that I heard the others cheering for me (Did you know that when you're concentrating really hard, you don't hear background noise? You tune it out. Really).

"Go, Mag--oh, darn…" Don's voice cut in (I heard this a _lot_).

Mike checked his wrist like he had a watch on (Which, incidentally, he didn't). "You lasted longer that time, Mags."

"Oh, goody." I groaned from my position on the floor. "That just makes _my_ day."

Raphael leaned over me. "Didn't block when you jumped. Try swinging your feet back next time, too. It'll help you land better if someone hits you from the front."

I reminded him that mid-air position change was a bit beyond me still.

He grinned evilly. "New drill tomorrow." He held out his hand to help me up.

Great. Oh, well, at least this meant practice was over for today (Raph never helped me up _during_ practice. If I couldn't get up under my own power, I wasn't worth spitting on). Practice was over for me, anyway.

I took a perverse joy at seeing Brian getting chucked off the mat over and over again. He had decided to take up more serious training when I beat him at a wrestling match…and a sparing match…and at any other sport he tried against me now. Revenge is very sweet, as long as it's fairly harmless. And three guesses as to who became his teacher, but you'll only need one.

"Pay attention to where my hands are!" Raph bellowed, and launched him off the mat again.

Oh, revenge was sweet, indeed. Not to mention that my cleaning duties were cut in half…with the exception of when I really screwed up (Doing something really stupid, like mouthing off to Raphael)…which, actually, happened kind of a lot.

I got a friendly smack on the shoulder when I perched myself beside Leonardo, who watched the proceedings carefully to make sure Raph didn't enjoy himself too much.

Leo and I had come to an uneasy peace when I asked him to teach me calligraphy with the set he gave me. And believe you me, you don't wanna know how hard it is to learn from a perfectionist. According to Leonardo, I didn't even _breathe _right (This was usually where I started rolling my eyes, and got thwacked on the head by his brush). It was fun to learn Japanese writing, at any rate, though I still couldn't read it that well.

Donatello had taken great joy in trying to teach me the spoken Japanese language, and that _had_ been fun. Michael taught me all the good swear words, and I got to practice with Splinter (No, I didn't use the swear words on Splinter! What do think I am, stupid?), and he smiled every time I got it right. It made one feel pretty good when Splinter was impressed with you.

We didn't see him much, nowadays. I guess the cold was getting to his old bones, and he stayed wherever it was the Turtles and he lived. I guess they felt they were protecting Brian and me by not saying where they lived, but all the secrecy got to me sometimes. After all, weren't we trustworthy?

Brian deduced that they must have other human friends, as well, who they either lived with, or visited on the odd day they weren't hanging out with us. This made me feel jealous (They were _my_ secret, after all. Who said I had to share?), but I didn't say as much, and they danced around any questions we asked.

Two years had gone by, almost. There had been a few birthdays (They called it their "mutation day"), making them the ripe old age of eighteen. Very worldly, by my measuring stick. I was also now fifteen (They had given me very bizarre birthday parties. Green chocolate is not very visually appealing, trust me), and feeling very sophisticated for my age, being now somewhat bilingual and having learned many grown-up fighting techniques. Raphael usually served me my comeuppance when I was in such a mood, but when he was busy with Brian, I got it from Leo.

Not that I was jealous, or anything. It had made me feel kind of special to know his entire attention had been on me, and me alone. Right now, with Brian needing so much more "showing of what he did wrong" and general instruction (After all, he was still a beginner), I was just feeling a little left out. All right, a _lot_ left out.

I fumed on this a little moodily, and it took the fun out of watching my brother get slaughtered.

I watched Leo, Don and Mike cheer my brother on, and it added fuel to the fire. They didn't grin at _me_ like that. Hmph. Men. They always stick to their own.

I got up, and shoved my now numb hands in my pockets (There was no heat in that building. We stayed warm by virtue of adrenaline alone). "I'm going home."

"Aw!" Mike frowned. "We were gonna cuss Raph out together, remember?"

I scuffed my toe in the floor, staring at my distorted reflection. "I got a project for school that's due tomorrow."

Don's head snapped up. "What project? You never said anything to me--"

"It's for writing, Don. I didn't need help." Don frowned. Actually, I could have used his help. I think he liked to be needed. _Like me._ Only I wasn't needed at the moment. The guinea pig was off the hook for the time being. And since I didn't feel much like hanging, "I'm outta here."

"All right." Don said uncertainly. "See you tomorrow?"

"Maybe. I might have stuff to do."

I headed for the door, but not before I saw Don and Leo exchange looks.

The expression was pretty plain.

_What's wrong with her?_

There was frost on the sidewalks still. Man, you'd think it would melt off by midday, but the temperatures just weren't up there.

I, of course, was off in my own little world, thinking that none of them appreciated me, and didn't notice the group of people until I ran into them.

Of course.

It was destiny, I think.

And Ol' Mr. Leather Jacket, Ol' Buddy, Ol' Pal, was right there with them. "Hey Princess."

_That's Princess Margaret the Matchstick, if you please_. It sprang out of my brain and all the way to my laugh reflex before I could stop it. I giggled (Along with running into the wrong people, I have this awful habit of laughing at exactly the wrong moments. It's a talent).

"You find something funny?" He said, not quite so easygoing.

"Uh, no…" I started. "It's just, um, never mind."

"No, no," He gestured to the whole group. "We're dying to know. What's so funny, Princess?"

_The Princess Matchstick would like her royal mouth to shut, if you please --_giggle. Stop laughing, you idiot.

They were all glaring at me.

_Awfully bad mannered courtiers I have, though. _I couldn't stop them now. Giggles bubbled up past my vocal chords, and both hands over my mouth didn't seem to slow them. I was done for. They were going to kill me. And yet, it wasn't hysterical laughter that filled me. These guys were _nothing._

They were _nothing_ and they didn't even know what they were up against.

_Surprise is going to be you're greatest ally. They'll never suspect a skinny little girl like you._

Thanks, Raph. Lots of useful teachings up that nonexistent sleeve of yours.

I saw it coming easy. Mr. Leather Jacket took a swing at me (I noted that he didn't punch correctly), and I dodged it, just as easily. Just stepped aside. Ho-hum. What's for dinner, Mags? Knuckle sandwiches, ha ha.

Mr. Leather Jacket kept right on going, and had to catch himself, sort of stumbling. Moron. Never throw you're full weight into a punch. _Never_ go off-balance! Where had this guy learned to fight? Daycare?

_And you used to be terrified of him and all the others like him._

The irony gods were rolling on the floor.

Don't hit yet. There's too many of them. Walk away if you still can.

One of them grabbed my arm. _You're bringing this on yourselves, you jerks._

I twisted my arm out of his grip by pulling toward his thumb. _Find a weak spot, and exploit it._

Another one tried to come in at me and hit me. Sidestep dodge. He went straight into a brick wall.

_Morons. My-Lanta, these guys are complete idiots!_

Yes, but many idiots still have the advantage over one intellectual. Concentrate.

One of them tried to kick me. It's laughable, really. That's the kind of stuff Raph was throwing at me _months_ ago. Who'da thunk?

And then, less than a minute later, it was all over. Un-freaking-believable. I kept waiting for better punches, for them to wisen up and start _really_ fighting, but, no dice. How weird is that? _Take a bow, Princess. You won the crown!_

They ran for it. I wasn't quite blinding-move-you-don't-even-see quick, but I was pretty fast. Wow.

And the only thing I could think to say was, "Dang. Is that it?"

This was my mighty victory. The part I had been training for, all these months. And…that was it?

Clapping sounded for somewhere close by; above me, it sounded like. Smart-alecks. They were watching. I should have known they would follow me.

And so, savoring my victory, I bowed, smiling.

I elected to double back and share my victory, but only Michaelangelo was there.

"You're brother went home already." He grinned at me. He knew what I was here about.

"I don't want my brother, doofus." I poked him playfully in the plastron. "Where's everybody else?"

His grin widened. "On the roof. You wanna come?"

An invitation to go somewhere outside the warehouse? My victory had sent me up in the world.

He hopped up. "I'm leeeeeeeeaaaving."

I trotted quickly after him. "I'm coming, I'm coming."

The world of the rooftops is intoxicatingly different from that of the ground. For one thing, there's no one up there. There is a wonderful sense of solitary-ness, of alone-ness, that makes you shiver and grin to yourself. I felt like I was on some long-awaited adventure that was for the select few.

So, of course, the sight that greeted me when we met up with Mike's brothers left me completely baffled.

They were on a roof, a flat tile roof, and it was pitched at a nice steep angle. As I walked up, Don plunked down on his shell, pulled up his legs, and slid down with a "Wheeeeeee!!"

It was quite possibly the most bizarre thing I have ever seen, or ever will see.

I turned to Mike, silently questioning.

He smiled tolerantly, like a PE teacher showing a first grader how to play baseball. "The frost makes it nice and slippery. You wanna try? It's fun."

I watched, with utter bewilderment, as Leo…_Leo_ (Of the serious nature…of the unsmiling, unlaughing face) slide down on his back, _yodeling_ at the top of his voice.

I blinked. _Yodeling. _Sure. Okay. Why not?

It was a side I had never seen to him before, to Don before, and _oh my god was that RAPH sliding down now?_

He was hooting and hollering like a cowboy, all the way down.

I could deal with this. So, outside those warehouse walls, they shared a few weird games. A little secret looniness, if you will. No big thing, right?

"You wanna try?" Mike repeated, waving a hand in front of my face.

"Are you going to catch me?" I looked at him doubtfully.

Mike chuckled. "If you want, but only the first time down." He trotted off at a quick pace. "Last one there's a goooooooo-ber!"

I sprinted after him. "Hey, wait up!"

It was harder for me. Frostbite of the nether regions is not something turtles often suffer from, I'll bet. We compromised on an old piece of burlap Mike dug up somewhere. And I hollered…and I yodeled…and I "Wheeeeeee!"-d, all the way down. Mike was true to his word…he only caught me the first time. The rest of the time, I stopped myself by skidding into a brick wall.

"You'd make a great skier, Mags!" Raphael chuckled.

"Well, then, I guess that's one less thing you have to teach me, huh?" I countered.

I heard Don snort behind me. "Like _we've_ ever been skiing."

I smiled at them all. "Well, neither have I."

We were a team. A group.

Equals.

My mom was giving me a dirty look when I walked in the door.

"Do you know who was just on the phone?" She asked calmly.

I shook my head. Of course I didn't know who was on the phone. I had just walked in, for crying out loud.

"The Librarian." She continued, in the same tone.

I nodded. The Librarian. The…oh, shoot. That's where I was supposed to be, today. And _all_ of this week. It was my cover.

"Care to explain?" The same tone. Oh, man. She's _pissed_.

I squirmed. "I…I can't, Mom."

"Why? Margaret, _why?_" She only used Margaret when she was _really_ upset.

"I…" I shot a look a Brian. He was looking at the floor. Shoot. She'd got him, too. I thought of my friends, about their laughter today. "I can't tell you, mom."

My mom frowned. Gads, she probably thought I was involved in a gang. Or drugs. But I couldn't give her any reassurance that I _wasn't_ doing anything wrong. Boy, I was in a fix now.

"You are grounded until I say otherwise." She said in that same, strange calm voice. "Go to your room, Margaret."

I walked, stiff-legged, into my prison cell.

Brian hauled-tail in there as soon as my mom let him go. "Maggie, we're in real trouble."

"I know."

"No, _real_ trouble, Maggie."

"I _know_, Brian."

"No, you don't. Dad got a job."

I stopped. "Brian, that's _good_ news. How are we in trouble for that?"

"We're moving to _Oregon_, Maggie."

The world stopped.

Well, that was an altogether different matter from simple grounding, wasn't it? It was in a whole different _league_.

Egad, that was across the _nation_. That was, like, three thousand miles away. It might as well have been halfway around the _world_, for all I knew of it.I had never before been outside New England, even. This was bad. Very, very bad.

Somehow, I imagined that when the world ended, there would be more fireworks.

Instead, it was just cold, with a small dose of crying.

_This is how the world ends. This is how the world ends. This is how the world ends. Not with a bang but a whimper. -T.S. Eliot; __**The Hollow Men**_


	7. Chapter 7

Obake Memories

Obake Memories

By LeahNardo

Chapter 7: Seishin no Obake (Ghosts of the Mind)

One can only have the world yanked out from under them so many times before they rebel. We had moved seven times during my lifetime. But this took the cake.

My mother didn't understand, of course. I didn't have any obvious friends here, what was I worried about losing?

_Everything._

I didn't answer her. How could I? So my sullen silence remained another behavior my mother was helpless to explain.

Raphael didn't take it well either. None of them did. But I was the worst off. A month had passed since I heard the bad news. We were leaving in two days. My dad had flown ahead and found us a house (I had never lived in a house. It was going to be weird to not hear everything my neighbors were doing). The boxes were packed, and everything was ready to go. Except me.

I felt like I was moving to Siberia. Or worse, Antarctica. Banished from the face of existence.

"You can write letters to us." Mike tried to ease the blow, sitting atop my windowsill. I had refused to leave my room for anything but school, and the occasional grabbing of food since my enforced imprisonment in the apartment. Poor Jessica, my sister, had been driven out by my foul temper on more than one occasion.

"They have mail in Oregon?" I asked darkly.

"Yeah. I hear they even have flushing toilets and working phones." Mike grinned.

"Stop trying to cheer me up." I said, chucking little bits of my notebooks across the room into my laundry hamper. They had my notes for all my classes, but what the hey? I wouldn't be needing them. I would be moving. To Oregon. Gad, even the name bespoke fish and tree-loving weirdos. "I'm not in a cheery mood."

"I think you'll live through it." Mike mused.

"I don't_ want_ to live through it." I chucked a particularly large wad of paper. My aim was off, true to form, and it bounced pointlessly off the wall. I felt like that piece of paper. Thrown to the winds of Fate and blown wherever they saw fit. Never able to choose for myself.

Mike frowned. He didn't do that often. "Master always says living sometimes sucks, but it sure beats the alternative." I was not amused. "Maggie, you would have had to leave sometime, for something. You can't always stay where and with who you want to. Change is the constant of the universe, man."

I rounded on him. "I don't know. Have you ever been driven out of your home when you didn't want to leave, _man_?" My tone bit, and he flinched. The matchstick had a viper's tongue.

"Yeah, actually." He said it softly, his jaw tight. "More than once."

Oh, I struck a nerve. I had never set my temper on Mike before. Talk first, repent later. Time to repent. "Sorry, Mike. I didn't mean it to sound like that. It just feels so…unfair."

"You know why I came?" He gave me a piercing look.

"To give me your chocolate chip cookie recipe as a going away present?" I tried to ease the stab I had made.

His mouth twitched. "Naw. I never give away my secrets."

Aim. Shoot. A piece of paper nailed the outside rim of the laundry basket, and rolled easily in. _She shoots, she scores!_ "For the obvious pleasure of my company, then, or lack thereof." I smirked.

"Splinter wants to see you."

I rolled another piece of paper between my palms thoughtfully. "He can't come out in the cold, though, can he? His arthritis would be too bad."

"Yeah." Mike agreed. "He wants you to come to the dojo--" The 'dojo', that was rich. "He has some things to say to you."

I let fly another paper wad. "Mike, I can't leave. I'm _grounded_." Shoot. Missed by a long shot.

"He'll be waiting for you after school tomorrow."

"Mike, I--" He was gone. Darn ninja. Two years and I _still_ hadn't caught on to how they did that.

All right, then. It was Splinter, or my mother. I'd rather face the Wrath of Mom than not face Splinter at all.

"Mom?" I leaned on the doorpost to the living room, where my mom sat reading on the couch.

She took her reading glasses off and looked up at me. "Oh, so you've decided you're speaking to me again?"

"I guess." I wrapped my arms around myself. I had found a way to ease my conscience. "I have to go somewhere tomorrow after school."

"Have you forgotten you're grounded?" She set her book aside.

"No. But I need to go, Mom. It's important." I studied my mother soberly.

"Where are you going?"

"I can't say, Mom." I dug my fingers into my arms. "I have to say goodbye to some friends."

"Are you going to their house?" She folded her arms.

I bit my lip, and decided to spill a little more. "They don't have a house, Mom. I don't know where they live."

My mother twitched. "Are they homeless?"

"I don't know."

"So, where are you meeting them?" She gave me a certified Leo Look.

"I told you, I can't say."

She sighed. A long, drawn out sound as she rubbed her eyes. Boy, she was starting to look old. There was gray forming at her temples. It was hard to think she had once been my age. I had seen pictures. She looked a lot like me (Or, to put it straight, I looked a lot like her).

I bit my lip again. "It's important to me, Mom. They're my best friends. Can't I see them one last time before we leave?"

My mother sighed again, and looked at me. The same probing, piercing look Mike had given me earlier. "Maggie, you're going to be an adult soon. I have to start trusting you somewhere along the way…are these the people you've been hanging out with all this time?"

"Yes." Another stitch broke in the web of secrecy. I was surprised it didn't whiplash me when I cut it. "I'm sorry I didn't tell you about them, Mom."

My mother gave me an exasperated look. "What have you been doing all this time?"

I tried to look serious. "Would you believe studying?" It was the truth, in a manner of speaking (And Don _had_ helped me study).

She shook her head in amazement. "Is that why your grades improved?"

I gave her a surly look. "They weren't that bad before, Mom."

She chewed on that for a minute. "I want you home before dark." She looked like she had stretched to give that much. I wasn't going to push for more.

"Thanks, Mom. It means a lot to me." I ran back to my room, fairly giddy. I could go, and it was okay!

And so, all was made right with my mother again. She never did learn who pulled those pranks, though. And I wasn't telling. Some secrets are better kept.

The warehouse was silent as I walked in. My steps echoed up the stairs to the second floor, and the room I had spent one-seventh of my life cleaning for two solid years. I almost felt like cleaning it one last time, just for good measure. Almost, but not quite (Nostalgic cleaning. How odd is that?).

Splinter sat in his chair, wrapped up in an old blanket. I plopped down in front of him.

"Hi." I said.

"Hello, Maggie." He replied with a nod.

All right. The conversation was really cooking now.

"You wanted to see me?"

"Yes." He folded his hands in his lap. "Michelangelo has told me you have been melancholy."

I shrugged and looked at my knees. "More just unhappy." I paused, propped my chin on my hand. "I just don't think it's fair that I have to leave. It sucks rocks." There, that summed up the whole sorry experience. Slang was often so adequate for that.

He nodded thoughtfully, like I had said something worth listening to. "Change is a necessary thing for us to grow, Maggie."

I knocked a piece of dirt across the floor with a stray finger. "I know. Adversity is good for the character, and all that."

"One should not dwell on the past." He was smiling, I could hear it. "But that does not mean we should forget it entirely. We will write you. Raphael especially will be interested to know if you are keeping up your training." (They had given me an address with one of their human friends, an April O'Neil, that they said they trusted. We'd pass letters through her.)

I couldn't help the smile. "I'm sure he will." Gad, I could feel my throat tightening up just thinking about the grouchy goober. No more getting thrown off the mats. No more camaraderie between fighters. I cleared my throat. "So, where are they today? Aren't they going to come say good-bye?"

"I believe they had some business to take care of with your brother."

"Oh."

Well, that was it, then, wasn't it? I got to my feet and leaned over to hug him. He felt so small and fragile in my arms. It might take _years _for me to get back to New York, and Splinter was so old…he might be dead by then. Stupid me, I started sniffling in his kimono'd shoulder.

"I'll miss you."

He gave me a strong squeeze, stronger than someone of his age and health should have been able to. "And I shall miss you, child. I have no daughters my son's age, but you made it seem I did for a time."

We hugged for a long minute, then I let him go. As I backed up a few paces, Splinter mustered the effort and stood. We faced each other for a moment, and he bowed. After another moment, I bowed back, rather awkwardly. Splinter smiled. "Sayonara, and safe journey, Ryuu-Fujin."

Dragon Lady. I bowed to him again, more sure this time, turned, and walked out the door, unable to speak.

I would never see him again.

Walking home, my throat was still tight. I didn't notice the two trench-coated figures until they were flanking me. One of them grabbed my arm.

"We require your services for a moment, miss." One trench-coated figure hissed in my ear.

I jumped, they caught me of guard so badly. I slugged the hisser in the arm. "Good grief, Leo, you almost gave me a heart attack!"

Don grinned on my other side. "I believe the victim of a kidnapping is not allowed to offer the kidnappers any lip. You're breaking the rules, Maggie."

They had _never_ made a public appearance for me before. "What, are you going to blindfold me and take me away in an unmarked van, too?"

True to form, an unmarked van pulled up, and they escorted me inside. Leo offered me a blindfold. "You wanna tie it or should we?"

I let him tie it. Might as well get my money's worth.

It took about twenty minutes to reach our destination, my captors silent all the while. I had a pretty good idea of what was going on, but I didn't say anything. I didn't want to ruin their fun. So, when the blindfold came off, and everyone threw confetti at me, yelling "Surprise!" I did my best to look shocked.

Mike sauntered up wearing a funny party hat and stuck an elaborate green cake under my nose. "Happy going away, Mags!"

I snagged a fingerful of the frosting. Chocolate. Figures. When would they learn that green chocolate just didn't look right?

I didn't care this time, though.

A CD blasted hip-hop from somewhere, and I reached over Mike's arm to grab Raphael. "C'mon, Raph, let's dance."

He grimaced. "I don't dance."

I shook my head at him. "You mean, for all the training you've had, for all the stuff you've perfected, O Great Sensei, you can't dance worth beans?"

He scowled. Good Old Raph. "I could if I tried. Just never tried, that's all." He grouched.

"_Sure_ you could."

That did it. He grabbed me and probably would of wailed the shoes off me, but seemed to stop with second thoughts. He finally tossed my wrist aside. "I'll let you off 'cause you're leavin, and all." He finally decided. I grinned.

Mike grabbed my arm. "C'mon, Mags, I'll dance with ya."

It was hard to leave them. Even harder than I imagined it would be. But I had said my good-byes. And I lived through it, despite much griping about what my therapist was going to hear about when I got older (Or so I threatened my Mom).

Oregon turned out to be much like New York. Only really green. And, um, fresh-airy. And _rainy_. Gad, it never stopped raining there.

I waited by the mailbox every day waiting for letters and faithfully wrote them, as well.

A lot happened in my absence. Donatello got a human girlfriend a few months after I left (Will wonders never cease? The Shy Guy must have something hidden up his sleeve I never saw…and after all, he _was_ eighteen. Raging hormones, and all that); she enjoyed science and computers immensely, and Don was much impressed with her intelligence. Raphael nagged me worse than my grandmother. Was I doing my push-ups? Was I practicing every day? It got so I started my letters to him "Did nine miles and one-hundred push-ups today…and I'm doing better on that sweep I was having trouble with last week…"

Leonardo's letters were brief and to the point. All was well, Mike had put a rubber chicken in the oven and Don roasted it by accident, and they might just never get rid of the smell…Mike denied these claims vehemently, as a matter of course. I always felt that I was missing all the fun, but wrote the many events of my mundane life…I'd gone to the State Competition for track and field, won a state essay contest…gotten a date with a guy shorter than me for Homecoming (He was also about half my weight…keep in mind, though, I was nearly six feet and only 118 pounds at the time. It took a few more years, workouts or no, for me to fill out properly. Until then, I had many teachers concerned for my eating habits, though I ate like a horse). I made new friends, and wrote less and less as my life became busier and busier. Their letters also became less and less frequent.

Finally, inexplicably, the letters just stopped coming completely two months after my seventeenth birthday. Then the letters that I wrote came back, listed _addressee moved; no forwarding address_. The situation was so far advanced in its neglect and I was so busy with senior year activities, that I didn't really pay it much mind.

Three years later, when I was offered a scholarship to Columbia University in New York after completing a Two-Year Associate's Degree, I had nearly forgotten them altogether. They had become just another childhood dream I left behind in the land of A Long Time Ago In A Land Far, Far Away…and then I walked by the Old Haunted Warehouse…


	8. Chapter 8

Obake Memories Obake Memories

By LeahNardo

Epilogue

It's funny the things that a place will make you remember. Here I stood, older, stronger, and hopefully wiser. There was the cracked mirror that Raph had accidentally thrown me into (It was _my_ fault for not blocking, as I recall). There was the gouge in the floor made by my science project, with a little (lot) of help from Donatello (A volcano filled with sulfuric acid. Only Don would think of something like that). There was the stain on the mat where I spilled my calligraphy ink (And _boy_, had I got a walloping from Leonardo for that one, let me tell you). Behind the now dusty pile of mats, several faded candy wrappers echoed ghosts of people past.

Where were They now? If They were anywhere, alive, at all. Years had taught me a lot about the way the world works, and how unfair life can be to those that are different. I considered myself different, as well. How can you consider yourself status quo when you've been trained by dragons, haunted by imps, and abducted by aliens? Those are the kind of things that change you for life. Not exactly anything you can tell your therapist, either.

And I _had_ kept the secret, all these years. So much so, that Brian and I finally believed Them to be part of another of our imaginary games. A fragment of an active childhood now long gone. Yet, here was the old building. It _was_ real, wasn't it?

Walking down the alley, I'd had to pause at the dark doorway, ingrained childhood instincts still making me tense and wait for something to come sailing out at me. But nothing did. No prickles on the back of my neck, either, which I still used as my most accurate diviner for weirdness. Not even a cat rooting around and making general background noise. Nothing but silence.

If you've ever gone back to your old elementary school after you've graduated high school; that's what it felt like. Well, it would have been more accurate had your school been condemned and left to muster in its old age. It was a wonder they hadn't ripped the old building down by now. Like I said, everyone must have held it in the same high esteem I did. No graffiti, no beer bottles, the only trash that which we ourselves had left years ago. Still haunted.

Maybe for real now.

A shudder ran up and down my back at the thought.

I had effectively searched the entire room to prove I wasn't nuts and making myself believe my childhood fantasies. No evidence They had ever been there. My hand or Brian's had put all the trash here that I could see, at least as far as I could remember. All right. One more place to check.

I pushed open the door on the other side of the moldering old dance studio. I had only been through it once before. When I became an equal for the first time.

I felt the same thrill of being above the world as I walked out onto the roof that I felt the first time I went up. This time, though, there were no whoops and yells to disturb the cathedral silence. I felt like I was the only person on earth. Indeed, I might have been, as still as it was.

The wind sounded like the far away howling of a tortured soul, and it moved bits of fluff and paper hither and yon across the rooftop. I walked over to the steep-sided incline that I'd had such fun sliding down in winter, now devoid of snow and ice. The wall at the bottom was a catch-all for bits of stuff that the wind carried here. Papers, wrappers, a few cigarette butts.

I saw it first as a fluttering scrap of color, caught on the corner of the roof. I made my careful way over to it, unwedging it from the cranny it was snagged in.

A long strip of red fabric, not yet faded by time and weather.

_Raph wore a mask just this color._

I stared at it for a long minute, and then carefully extended my senses. Nada. There wasn't anyone close by. I was sure of it. I hadn't become _that_ lax in my training yet, though I'm sure Raphael would have my hide for a wall hanging if he knew how often I practiced nowadays.

That was another thing I did almost on instinct. For a long time I wasn't sure exactly _why_ I was doing it. Practice had become part of my daily routine, like brushing my teeth or eating breakfast. It wasn't something you analyzed in great detail; you just did it and continued on to work or chores or whatnot. I had almost convinced myself in high school that it was part of my track training routine, thought that didn't include kicks or punches or jumps or sweeps…looking back on it, I wonder why I _didn't_ analyze it greater after I had forgotten Them. Perhaps my frazzled brain had suppressed the memories, and steered my thoughts away from anything that might trigger them. Though I don't know why that would be the case. The time I had spent with my guys (Yes, they were still mine, even after all these years) were some of the best times of my life. Maybe I just didn't want to remember what I had lost.

And maybe, just maybe, had back again, if the scrap of fabric in my hand was any indication.

My cynical brain immediately jumped all over that bit of reasoning. I had no reason to think this wasn't a piece of someone's scarf or shirt.

But _maybe_…

It was enough to hope, at least for now.

I tucked the scrap in my pocket carefully, and headed back downstairs. I had started the day just going to see my old apartment complex (Rumor around campus had been they were going to tear down the old eyesore. If so, I wanted to be on hand for it. Like I said, I have very few fond memories of that building), and ended up with a whole other aspect of my life to consider. I had a feeling this was really going to cut into my already too short sleep time.

I stopped off on the way home to get some groceries. I was in the line when it became apparent that my age-old coin purse was missing, and with it, my money.

"Do you know where you might have dropped it?" The cashier asked, not unkindly.

I ran a hand through my hair in exasperation. "I've gone ten million different places today. The last time I checked for it was when I got on the subway this morning. It could be anywhere." I shook my head. "It's not the money that I mind losing; there wasn't that much in there. I've had that purse since I was ten. Sentimental value and all that."

The cashier shrugged and I got out of line. Well, no dinner for me tonight, I guess. Furthermore, I didn't have my school ID, or my personal information card (The thought of someone walking around knowing exactly where they could find me left me feeling a bit ill), which was also in there. My teachers would have a fit.

Yes, it was turning out to be a really stellar day.

I got a lecture from my roommate upon my return to my apartment. Having had my fill of people in general and needing some time to myself to chew on my resurfaced memories, I locked myself in my room to study and contemplate.

My stomach drove me to go out and beg for food, only to find her cupboards as empty as mine and a note saying she had gone out to eat and could I throw her clothes in the dryer for her? I tossed it aside in disgust and went back to work, trying to steer my mind away from food and genetic mutations (The unfortunate chapter I was studying in biology class).

I was concentrating so hard that the world did not exist until my roommate suddenly said into my ear, "Hello, O Contemplator of the Cosmos. Want some fries?"

I jerked in my chair, and winced as my neck and back protested. "What, fries?" My roommate was not known for sharing rare treasures such as french fries.

She grinned slyly. "Only if you let me have some of those chocolate chip cookies you baked."

I sat there for a moment, completely stunned.

_Déjà vu._

I jumped past her into the kitchen, and low and behold, there they were. Michaelangelo's secret recipe. And stuck underneath the plate, my old coin purse, which I had probably dropped when I stuffed the scrap of fabric in my pocket on the roof.

Well, that solved both my problems in one fell swoop. I felt my chest flutter with happiness at finding Them again.

There _was_, however, just one thing that bothered me.

My roommate ran for her room when I shrieked, "How the_ HELL _did they get in here?!"

The End!! I hope you liked it!


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